All Forum Posts by: Rod F.

you will have to sign personal guarantees. you have to build a credit history just like you did personally.  

Anytime you buy a home, New , old, a foreclosure, a 100 year old mansion. It should have been built to code at the time it was built.  Codes Change with time.

With that said. You wouldn't believe some of the stuff you find in houses,   Extension cords in walls, plugs sheet rocked over, live wires going no where.  That's why you check every plug, every light switch, every light fixture.  That's why your hiring an inspector. If you don't trust the one you hired, you hired the wrong one.  learn from him. your paying for the education. If you find a problem, talk to a professional and get more that one quote if there is a large estimate. I just saved 500 on a hvac repair by getting two professional estimates.

The first home is the hardest. I still get fooled by some houses. you think you have a pretty good handle on it and wham where did that come from. The hvac unit I just repaired was a 2007 model, The home owned just didn't take care of it.  New compressor.  Unit looked better than any one I had seen in a while.  Found out today that the one at the wife condo rental is bad, new unit  will be about 3500.  my unit at my personal house looks like it was run over by a truck, but it cools fine. Probably 30 yrs old.  go figure.  Good luck with your purchase which ever house it is.

Colton do you have this under contract? Get your estimate from the electrician doing the inspection and use it as a bargaining tool with the sales price.  If they don't want to fix it right. It's a good time to walk away.   I don't fall in love with any property.  

The city inspector is the one who can interpret the ordnances for you. I have gotten to know ours quite well.  He points me in the right direction and it solves a lot of problems before they show up.  

electrician, plumber, accountant, lawyer, hvac repairmen are all part of the TEAM. you need when your rehabbing.

,

If your uncomfortable with the repairs made. Hire an inspector.  If it was major work I would have someone look at it.

I had an issue one time on a house I owned and lived in. What turned out to be a busted lug on a ground wire. I called an electrician, he said 4500 dollars and we will rewire the entire house. I traced down the problem, and With the help of the local utility company representative, Replaced the lug and fixed the problem. He observed me do the repair, and said the problem was fixed. turned the power back on my house. The House has never had a problem again.   

As you said city ordinance says,

Homeowners may perform their own electrical work if they own the land and will personally occupy the structure.  He is occupying it at this time?

Like I said,  

If your uncomfortable with the repairs made. Hire an inspector.

I'm fortunate my new son in law is a master electrician.  If I need an opinion I call him.   

Time to move to another state,   ;] 

One other thing that I forget to mention about my litigation was.  The attorneys(2) that represented me . I directly asked them what could I do to protect my personal assets. Their reply was "I don't know".  I think I would be protecting  them from them too. 

After some thought and Consideration. I went to another town about 50 miles away, and hired a third attorney. Was hired to set up wills, and discuss my asset protection choices. 

I did everything he told me to do. as far as personal assets. My target went away.

The question that I was the most concerned about was the  Properties that I Had in a partnership LLc.

What he told me was it would be very unlikely they would go after the llc. but if for some reason they did. and If they did get a judgment against my part of the llc.   That I wouldn't have to pay it until I sold the property. 

 The two things that went through my mind was first. heck I wasn't ever planning on selling them anyway. 

But the one thing that I didn't want to do was work the next 20 years (average amortization.)  building up net worth for someone else.   And I would be as long as they kept the judgment filed.

That's when the ideas of multiple llc's was born in my investment portfolio. Judgment against one is not judgment against all.

llcs are not for everyone, you might owe millions, but every month you build equity. 

EQUITY FOR SOMEONE !!!

Joe.

like I said i cannot go into great detail about this.

As far as insurance, after the fact, I was told personal insurance doesn't  cover business transactions. zero coverage. I wasn't covered very well by insurance. but even then there are limits to your coverage.  not even legal representation was covered.

The llc could have filed bankruptcy.  closed shop.

on another case I sued a contractor I did work for 20k. attorney sued, contractor llc , and him personally.  Judge threw out personal suit. got judgment on llc,  He closed llc, with virtually no assets. started a new company the next week. another llc. only person that got paid was the attorney the 5k it cost me to sue.  that was another good lesson in llc's.

like they say "It's not if it's when u get sued." 

everyone is entitled to their opinion on this subject. it's up to you to protect yourself.

 My advise if I would give it to someone would be talk to your attorney and accountant. They know the laws. my experiences are what has happened to me. I am just sharing what I can about the education I have paid dearly for.

 Don't bury your head in the sand and hope they won't notice you. The more you grow, the bigger target you are.  the corporate veils , are your protection.

Thomas the llc paid cash for house, including all rehab repairs. the rents collected are the 18 to 20 % cash returned to the IRA, annually. don't even consider the appreciation in my return figure. actually after rehab. there was an approximately 60% increase in market value. (appraised). the 18 to 20% is rents less taxes and insurance. everything goes back to ira for future investments. I fixed everything , no callbacks. only call I had this year on that house was a light fixture not working turned out to be light bulb.

I could not buy a property i currently owned. title is in IRA, owned by a trust. I act as manager and hold checkbook. every transaction has to have transparency. nothing gets charged to account except business transactions. not even a coke or gallon of gas. It has it's own bank account, and credit accounts.

House two is being rehabbed now, trying to decide on flipping or holding. again cash transaction.